Directly benefits sports, education, culture
PHILIPSBURG: Minister of Education, Culture, Youth and Sport, Ardwell Irion stated on Tuesday that he intends to finalize an amendment to the tax holiday law that would result in much-needed funds for education, sports and culture. The Minister explained that he began work on the amendment as a Member of Parliament and intends to see it through now as the Minister responsible for Education, Culture, and Sports.
He noted that in August of 2019, former Minister of Finance Perry Geerlings, announced that the government had approved a tax holiday for four resorts. These incentives were granted to provide the hotels with some relief as they rebuild after the hurricanes of 2017.
However, Minister Irion said that while tax holidays are looked at as an incentive for hotel properties, government struggles to recoup these tax funds via other means. As such, it behooves the government to find a way for entities that wish to derive a financial benefit from St. Maarten, to still contribute significantly to St. Maarten.
In this context, Minister Irion’s amendment would call for a commitment of NAf 500,000 from an entity that qualifies for the tax holiday measure. This NAf 500,000 would then go towards education, culture, and sports. Looking back at the 4 properties that received tax holidays in August, the Minister said if the law amendment was in place, this would have resulted in some NAf 2 million for the aforementioned sectors.
“By providing assistance through incentives, governments are choosing to invest public resources to make private investments feasible and therefore receive investment returns in the form of economic impact. We need to go a step further and ensure that the most vital needs of our community are met directly and the people feel the benefits of investments in their country directly. The amendment would see a direct injection into our sporting facilities, cultural events, schools etc. thus relieving some of the burdens on the budget,” the Minister said.
